Acquiring a new second language contrast: an analysis of the English laryngeal system of native speakers of Dutch

This study examines the acquisition of the English laryngeal system by native speakers of (Belgian) Dutch. Both languages have a two-way laryngeal system, but while Dutch contrasts prevoiced with short-lag stops, English has a contrast between short-lag and long-lag stops. The primary aim of the article is to test two hypotheses on the acquisition process based on first language acquisition research: (1) native speakers of a voicing language will succeed in producing short-lag stops in the target aspirating language, since short-lag stops occur early in first language acquisition and can be considered unmarked and since one member of the contrast is formed by short-lag stops in both voicing and aspirating languages, and (2) native speakers of a voicing language will succeed in acquiring long-lag stops in the target language, because aspiration is an acoustically salient realization. The analysis is based on an examination of natural speech data (conversations between dyads of informants), combined with the results of a controlled reading task. Both types of data were gathered in Dutch as well as in Eng(Dutch) (i.e. the English speech of native speakers of Dutch). The analysis revealed an interesting pattern: while the first language (L1) Dutch speakers were successful in acquiring long-lag aspirated stops (confirming hypothesis 2), they did not acquire English short-lag stops (rejecting hypothesis 1). Instead of the target short-lag stops, the L1 Dutch speakers produced prevoiced stops and frequently transferred regressive voice assimilation with voiced stops as triggers from Dutch into English. Various explanations for this pattern in terms of acoustic salience, perceptual cues and training will be considered

Laryngeal stop systems in contact: connecting present-day acquisition findings and historical contact hypotheses

This article examines the linguistic forces at work in present-day second language and bilingual acquisition of laryngeal contrasts, and to what extent these can give us insight into the origin of laryngeal systems of Germanic voicing languages like Dutch, with its contrast between prevoiced and unaspirated stops. The results of present-day child and adult second language acquisition studies reveal that both imposition and borrowing may occur when the laryngeal systems of a voicing and an aspirating language come into contact with each other. A scenario is explored in which socially dominant Germanic-speaking people came into contact with a Romance-speaking population, and borrowed the Romance stop system

Phonetic drift

This chapter provides an overview of research on the phonetic changes that occur in one’s native language (L1) due to recent experience in another language (L2), a phenomenon known as phonetic drift. Through a survey of empirical findings on segmental and suprasegmental acoustic properties, the chapter examines the features of the L1 that are subject to phonetic drift, the cognitive mechanism(s) behind phonetic drift, and the various factors that influence the likelihood of phonetic drift. In short, virtually all aspects of L1 speech are subject to drift, but different aspects do not drift in the same manner, possibly due to multiple routes of L2 influence coexisting at different levels of L1 phonological structure. In addition to the timescale of these changes, the chapter discusses the relationship between phonetic drift and attrition as well as some of the enduring questions in this area.https://drive.google.com/open?id=1eQbh17Z4YsH8vY_XjCHGqi5QChfBKcAZhttps://drive.google.com/open?id=1eQbh17Z4YsH8vY_XjCHGqi5QChfBKcAZhttps://drive.google.com/open?id=1eQbh17Z4YsH8vY_XjCHGqi5QChfBKcAZAccepted manuscriptAccepted manuscrip

At the edge of intonation: the interplay of utterance-final F0 movements and voiceless fricative sounds

The paper is concerned with the 'edge of intonation' in a twofold sense. It focuses on utterance-final F0 movements and crosses the traditional segment-prosody divide by investigating the interplay of F0 and voiceless fricatives in speech production. An experiment was performed for German with four types of voiceless fricatives: /f/, /s/, /ʃ/ and /x/. They were elicited with scripted dialogues in the contexts of terminal falling statement and high rising question intonations. Acoustic analyses show that fricatives concluding the high rising question intonations had higher mean centres of gravity (CoGs), larger CoG ranges and higher noise energy levels than fricatives concluding the terminal falling statement intonations. The different spectral-energy patterns are suitable to induce percepts of a high 'aperiodic pitch' at the end of the questions and of a low 'aperiodic pitch' at the end of the statements. The results are discussed with regard to the possible existence of 'segmental intonation' and its implication for F0 truncation and the segment-prosody dichotomy, in which segments are the alleged troublemakers for the production and perception of intonation

Native Speaker Perceptions of Accented Speech: The English Pronunciation of Macedonian EFL Learners

The paper reports on the results of a study that aimed to describe the vocalic and consonantal features of the English pronunciation of Macedonian EFL learners as perceived by native speakers of English and to find out whether native speakers who speak different standard variants of English perceive the same segments as non-native. A specially designed computer web application was employed to gather two types of data: a) quantitative (frequency of segment variables and global foreign accent ratings on a 5-point scale), and b) qualitative (open-ended questions). The result analysis points out to three most frequent markers of foreign accent in the English speech of Macedonian EFL learners: final obstruent devoicing, vowel shortening and substitution of English dental fricatives with Macedonian dental plosives. It also reflects additional phonetic aspects poorly explained in the available reference literature such as allophonic distributional differences between the two languages and intonational mismatch

Cues to gemination in word-initial position in Maltese

In this study we investigated word-initial geminates in Maltese, focusing on sub-segmental acoustic durations: constriction duration and, where appropriate, VOT; and the duration of adjacent segments: the tonic vowel duration and the duration of the inter-consonantal interval spanning the word boundary. This latter interval, between the consonant in the previous word and the singleton/geminate consonant, is measured so as to capture the presence and duration of a vocalic element, which has been referred to as epenthetic, and reportedly precedes word-initial geminates in the language. Whilst constriction duration plays an important role in distinguishing geminates from singletons (a ratio of 1.7:1), VOT does not. Moreover, although the duration of the following tonic vowel plays no role, the duration of the preceding context – the inter-consonantal interval – is a strong cue to gemination word-initially.peer-reviewe

Speech Perception in “Bubble” Noise: Korean Fricatives and Affricates By Native and Non-native Korean Listeners

The current study examines acoustic cues used by second language learners of Korean to discriminate between Korean fricatives and affricates in noise and how these cues relate to those used by native Korean listeners. Stimuli consist of naturally-spoken consonant-vowel-consonant-vowel (CVCV) syllables: /sɑdɑ/, /s*ɑdɑ/, /tʃɑdɑ/, /tʃhɑdɑ/, and /tʃ*ɑdɑ/. In this experiment, the “bubble noise” methodology of Mandel at al. (2016) was used to identify the time-frequency locations of important cues in each utterance, i.e., where audibility of the location is significantly correlated with correct identification of the utterance in noise. Results show that non-native Korean listeners can discriminate between Korean fricatives and affricates in noise after training with the specific utterances. However, the acoustic cues used by L2 Korean listeners are different from those used by native Korean listeners. There were explicit differences in the use of the acoustic cues between the two groups for identifying tenseness. The results of this study contribute to a better understanding of how second language learners of Korean process language. Furthermore, the current study helps us to better understand how people learning a second language process speech perception in noisy environments

Perception of English and Polish obstruents

Praca niniejsza koncentruje się na kontraście dźwięczna-bezdźwięczna w percepcji angielskich i polskich spółgłosek właściwych. Metodologia badań oparta została na manipulacji akustycznej parametrów temporalnych i spektralnych, które biorą udział w implementacji kontrastu dźwięczności w badanych językach. Porównane zastałych trzy grupy badanych – początkujący uczący się języka angielskiego, zaawansowani użytkownicy języka angielskiego, oraz rodowici mówcy języka angielskiego. Praca składa się z dwóch części teoretycznych, ilustrujących problematykę i kontrastujących strategie implementacji kontrastu dźwięczności w badanych językach, oraz części badawczej, prezentującej zastosowaną metodologię badań oraz analizę wyników. Część pierwsza porusza problem roli percepcji mowy w badaniach językoznawczych. Dotyka takich aspektów jak brak bezpośredniej relacji między sygnałem dźwiękowym a kategorią fonologiczną, wyjątkowa plastyczność i zdolność adaptacyjna ludzkiej percepcji mowy, oraz referuje propozycje dotyczące kompleksowego opisu działania ludzkiej percepcji mowy. W kolejnych podrozdziałach praca omawia percepcję w kontekście kontaktu językowego, a więc rozróżnianie kontrastów akustycznych występujących w języku obcym, ale nieobecnych w języku pierwszym. Zostają również zrecenzowane modele, które taki proces opisują, jak i hipotezy opisujące potencjalny sukces w opanowaniu efektywnej percepcji kontrastów percepcyjnych występujących w języku obcym. Część druga koncentruje się na różnicach temporalnych i akustycznych w implementacji dźwięczności w języku angielskim i polskim. Opisane zostają aspekty takie jak; Voice Onset Time, długość samogłoski, długość zwarcia, długość frykcji, ubezdźwięcznienie, długość wybuchu. Cześć trzecia, badawcza, prezentuje materiał poddany badaniu, metodologię manipulacji materiału, oraz charakterystykę grup. Hipotezy oparte na założeniach teoretycznych są następnie weryfikowane przy pomocy otrzymanych wyników. Część końcowa omawia problemy percepcyjne, jakie spotykają Polaków uczących się języka angielskiego oraz wyciąga wnioski pedagogiczne

Predictions on markedness and feature resilience in loanword adaptation

Normalement, un emprunt est adapté afin que ses éléments étrangers s’intègrent au système phonologique de la langue emprunteuse. Certains auteurs (cf. Miao 2005; Steriade 2001b, 2009) ont soutenu que, lors de l’adaptation d’une consonne, les traits de manière d’articulation sont plus résistants au changement que les traits laryngaux (ex. : le voisement) ou que ceux de place. Mes résultats montrent cependant que les traits de manière (ex. : [±continu]) sont impliqués dans les adaptations consonantiques aussi fréquemment que les autres traits (ex. [±voisé] et [±antérieur]). Par exemple, le /Z/ français est illicite à l’initiale en anglais. Les options d’adaptation incluent /Z/ → [z] (changement de place), /Z/ → [S] (changement de voisement) et /Z/ → [dZ] (changement de manière). Contrairement aux prédictions des auteurs précités, l’adaptation primaire en anglais est /Z/ → [dZ], avec changement de manière (ex. français [Zelatin] gélatine → anglais [dZElœtIn]). Plutôt qu’une résistance des traits de manière, les adaptations étudiées dans ma thèse font ressortir une nette tendance à la simplification. Mon hypothèse est que les langues adaptent les consonnes étrangères en en éliminant les complexités. Donc un changement impliquant l’élimination plutôt que l’insertion d’un trait marqué sera préféré. Ma thèse innove aussi en montrant qu’une consonne est le plus souvent importée lorsque sa stratégie d’adaptation primaire implique l’insertion d’un trait marqué. Les taux d’importation sont systématiquement élevés pour les consonnes dont l’adaptation impliquerait l’insertion d’un tel trait (ici [+continu] ou [+voisé]). Par exemple, /dZ/ en anglais, lorsque adapté, devient /Z/ en français après l’insertion de [+continu]; cependant, l’importation de /dZ/ est de loin préférée à son adaptation (89%). En comparaison, /dZ/ est rarement importé (10%) en germano-pennsylvanien (GP) parce que l’adaptation de /dZ/ à [tS] (élision du trait marqué [+voisé]) est disponible, contrairement au cas du français. Cependant, le /t/ anglais à l’initiale, lui, est majoritairement importé (74%) en GP parce que son adaptation en /d/ impliquerait l’insertion du trait marqué [+voisé]. Ma thèse permet non seulement de mieux cerner la direction des adaptations, mais repère aussi ce qui favorise fortement les importations sur la base d’une notion déjà établie en phonologie : la marque.A loanword is normally adapted to fit its foreign elements to the phonological system of the borrowing language (L1). Recently, some authors (e.g. Miao 2005; Steriade 2001b, 2009) have proposed that during the adaptation process of a second language (L2) consonant, manner features are more resistant to change than are non-manner features. A careful study of my data indicate that manner features (e.g. [±continuant]) are as likely to be involved in the adaptation process as are non-manner [±voice] and [±anterior]. For example, French /Z/ is usually not tolerated word-initially in English. Adaptation options include /Z/ → [z] (change of place), /Z/ → [S] (change of voicing) and /Z/ → [dZ] (change of manner). The primary adaptation in English is /Z/ → [dZ] (e.g. French [Zelatin] gélatine → English [dZElœtIn]) where manner is in fact the less resistant. Instead, during loanword adaptation there is a clear tendency towards unmarkedness. My hypothesis is that languages overwhelmingly adapt with the goal of eliminating the complexities of the L2; a change that involves deletion instead of insertion of a marked feature is preferred. Furthermore, my thesis shows for the first time that a consonant is statistically most likely to be imported if its preferred adaptation strategy involves insertion of a marked feature (e.g. [+continuant] or [+voice]). For example, the adaptation of English /dZ/ is /Z/ in French after insertion of marked [+continuant], but /dZ/ is overwhelmingly imported (89%), instead of adapted in French. I argue that this is to avoid the insertion of marked [+continuant]. This contrasts with Pennsylvania German (PG) where English /dZ/ is rarely imported (10%). This is because unlike in French, there is an option to adapt /dZ/ to /tS/ (deletion of marked [+voice]) in PG. However, English word-initial /t/ is heavily imported (74%), not adapted, in PG because adaptation to /d/ involves insertion of marked [+voice]. Not only does my thesis better determine the direction of adaptations but it also establishes the circumstances where L2 consonants are most likely to be imported instead of being adapted, on the basis of a well-known notion in phonology: markedness